The Intercept正在起诉得克萨斯州一个市政府，试图迫使对方公开与一处移民拘留设施发生的暴力冲突有关的警方记录。该冲突导致了今年早些时候具有里程碑意义的Prairieland审判。
The Intercept is suing a city government in Texas in a bid to release police records related to the violent confrontation at an immigration detention facility that led to the landmark Prairieland trial earlier this year.
在提交给州法院的文件中，The Intercept指控得克萨斯州阿尔瓦拉多市及其警察局拒绝公开根据该州《公共信息法》所申请的记录。这家新闻机构请求法官命令该市公开在美国移民和海关执法局Prairieland拘留设施外一场噪音示威活动发生前后数日的警方通讯记录。那场示威最终演变为武装冲突，并有人开枪。
In a filing in state court, The Intercept accused the city of Alvarado, Texas, and its police department of refusing to release records sought under the state’s Public Information Act. The news outlet asked a judge to order the city to release records of police communications on the days before and after a noise demonstration outside U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Prairieland detention facility that turned violent.
根据起诉书以及在此案中代表The Intercept的律师特里·穆奇勒的说法，尽管The Intercept同意支付数百美元获取这些记录，该市却未能处理这笔付款，使记录申请陷入悬而未决的状态。穆奇勒是一位长期维护记录获取权的资深人士。
Despite The Intercept agreeing to pay hundreds of dollars for the records, the city has failed to process the payment and left the records request in limbo, according to the complaint and to attorney Terry Mutchler, a veteran defender of records access who is representing The Intercept in the case.
“我干这一行已经30年了，就公众获取记录而言，这是我见过的最令人不安的案件之一，”穆奇勒说。“这是打了兴奋剂的拖延战术。”
“I’ve been doing this for 30 years, and this is one of the singularly most distressing cases that I’ve seen in terms of public access to records,” Mutchler said. “This is stonewalling on steroids.”
“The Intercept把支票开好了，现在该市既不肯兑现支票，也不肯把记录给我们——完全是无线电静默，”穆奇勒说。“这种情况是，公职人员应该为自己忘了他们为谁工作而感到羞耻。”阿尔瓦拉多市政府的一名代表没有立即回应置评请求。
“The Intercept cut the check, and now the city won’t cash the check and they won’t give us the records — it’s radio silence,” said Mutchler. “This is a situation where the public officials should be ashamed of themselves for forgetting who they work for.”A representative of the Alvarado city government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
这起诉讼源于自由记者C. Frances根据该州《公共信息法》提交的一项申请。她代表The Intercept寻求获取阿尔瓦拉多警察局人员与2025年7月4日Prairieland设施外一场噪音示威有关的通讯记录。那场抗议活动演变为武装对抗，并有人开枪。一名阿尔瓦拉多警察在枪击中受了非致命伤。
The complaint stems from a request filed under the state’s Public Information Act by freelance journalist C. Frances, who, on behalf of The Intercept, sought records of communications by Alvarado Police Department personnel in connection to a noise demonstration on July 4, 2025, at the Prairieland facility. The protest devolved into an armed confrontation and shots were fired. An Alvarado police officer suffered non-life-threatening injuries in the shooting.
包括当晚在场的人以及其他不同程度参与抗议的人在内，十几名抗议者在事件发生后被捕。
More than a dozen protesters, including people present that evening and others with varying levels of involvement in the protest, were arrested in the aftermath of the incident.
针对这些抗议者的案件成为特朗普政府打击激进左翼的试验场，最终许多共同被告被判处重刑，其中包括本杰明·宋，他因谋杀未遂和其他指控被判处100年监禁。宋和其他被告将对定罪提出上诉。
That case against the protesters became a proving ground of the Trump administration’s war on the activist left, ending with hefty sentences for many of the co-defendants, including Benjamin Song, who was sentenced to 100 years in prison for attempted murder and other charges. Song and other defendants are set to appeal their convictions.
这场记录之争始于2月16日，当时弗朗西丝向阿尔瓦拉多市政府提交了一份申请，要求获取其警察局在2025年7月4日至7月18日期间的内部和外部通信记录。在接下来的一个月里，经过与市政官员就申请范围反复交涉，弗朗西丝最终将申请缩小为与事件直接相关的所有电子邮件通信。数周后，市政府告知弗朗西丝，这些记录的费用——包括处理和涂黑所耗费的工时——总计854.17美元。
The records saga began on February 16, when Frances submitted a request to Alvarado city government for internal and external communications to and from its police department between July 4 and July 18, 2025. Over the next month, amid a back and forth with city officials over the scope of the request, Frances eventually narrowed her request to all email communications directly related to the incident. Weeks later, the city told Frances the bill for the records, including labor hours spent processing and redacting them, would come to $854.17.
数月后，经过一段被《拦截》杂志律师称为“曲折离奇的程序史”的反复交涉，《拦截》决定掏钱获取这些记录，并于4月按要求全额付款。
Months later, after a back and forth referred to by The Intercept’s counsel as a “tortured procedural history,” The Intercept decided to pony up for the records and issued a payment for the full amount requested in April.
《拦截》在周五提交的文件中写道：“尽管已收到付款，市政府和警察局均未提供任何相关邮件，未证明不存在相关信息，未获得或告知任何授权继续扣留所申请信息的总检察长决定，也未以其他方式对该申请作出实质性回应。”
“Despite receiving payment,” The Intercept wrote in its filing Friday, “neither the City nor the Police Department have produced any of the responsive emails, have not certified that no responsive information exists, have not obtained or communicated any attorney general decision authorizing continued withholding of the requested information, and have not otherwise responded substantively to the Request.”